Education on Programming with Robots: Examining Students’ Experiences and Views

Abstract

The present study aimed to determine the success and views of students receiving education on programming with robots. In the study, which was carried out with the mixed research method, the data were collected via a creative problem-solving test, applied performance evaluation test for programming with robots, a semi-structured interview form. The creative problem-solving skills test was taken from PISA 2012 conducted by OECD. The study was carried out with 9 secondary school students. In the application process, first, the students were asked to fill in the creative problem-solving test. The creative problem-solving test included interactive simulations in online environment and questions regarding these simulations. Following this, the students were given education on programming with robots for one week. At the end of this education, a performance evaluation test regarding this education was given. Lastly, an interview form was used to determine the students' views about the activity carried out. 429 Consequently, depending on the results of the applied performance evaluation test, the education could be said to be beneficial. As a result of the correlation test conducted, a moderate level of positive significant relationship was found between the students' creative problemsolving skills and their performance scores. When the students' responses to the interview questions were examined, it was revealed that the students generally had positive attitudes and that the education given was motivating and entertaining and contributed to their learning of programming.

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“…Results indicated that the problem-solving skills of middle school students increased significantly by coding VEX IQ robots. When we look at the results of the studies conducted in the literature, it is seen that both block-based programming environments and robotic activities contribute positively to problem-solving skills (Cankaya, Durak, & Yunkul, 2017;Shin & Park, 2014). However, some studies in the literature show that robotic or block-based programming causes not a significant difference (Cinar, 2019;Kalelioglu, 2015;Kalelioglu & Gulbahar, 2014).…”

Investigation of the Teaching Process of Programming in regards to Problem Solving Process and Perception of Self-Efficacy

“…Bu doğrultuda geleceğin öğretmeni olacak adayların programlama ve programlama öğretimine yönelik algı, tutum ve görüşlerini ortaya çıkarmak için yürütülen çalışmaların, ilgili öğretim sürecini daha iyi tasarlayabilmek için önem arz ettiği düşünülmektedir. İlgili alanyazında BT öğretmen adaylarının, bilgisayar programlamaya yönelik öz-yeterlik algıları ve tutumlarına (Yükseltürk & Altiok, 2017), programlamaya yönelik tutumlarına (Özyurt & Özyurt, 2015;Chen, Haduong, Brennan, Sonnert & Sadler, 2019), bilgisayar programlama öğretimine yönelik görüşlerine (Yükseltürk & Altiok, 2015;Çankaya, Durak & Yünkül, 2017) ve bu süreçte kullanılan araçlara ilişkin algılarına (Yükseltürk & Altiok, 2016;Davenport, 2018) yönelik çalışmaların mevcut olduğu görülmektedir. Ayrıca, programlama sürecini etkileyen öz-yeterlik gibi diğer faktörlerinde dikkate alınması gerekli görülmektedir (Ramalingam, LaBelle & Wiedenbeck, 2004;Jegede, 2009).…”

The European Conference on Education 2020: Official Conference Proceedings

“…As shown by Magnenat et al robots can be used in this field with great effect to teach the otherwise often abstract concept of event handling [15]. The effect of robots as a general tool to teach programming is also commonly tested and while the results are mixed [16,17] the robots were able to increase the motivation of the students [18].…”